Council clears way for sewer service to new Whitehall library

Whitehall City Council took emergency action Sept. 17 to provide the necessary easements for sanitary sewer service at the future Whitehall branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library.

KEVIN CORVO, ThisWeek Community News

Whitehall City Council took emergency action Sept. 17 to provide the necessary easements for sanitary sewer service at the future Whitehall branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library.

Two ordinances were introduced -- one abandoning a 40-foot easement that's no longer needed and another establishing a new 15-foot easement where the library requires it.

Both measures passed 5-0. Councilman Chris Rodriguez and Robert Bailey were absent.

Columbus Metropolitan Library officials held a groundbreaking ceremony Sept. 10 for a 20,000-square-foot library at 4445 E. Broad St., replacing the existing 7,466-square-foot Whitehall branch that opened in 1959 at the corner of East Broad Street and South Yearling Road.

The new branch is expected to open in June 2014.

In other action Sept. 17, council voted 4-1 to allow a special permit for Advance America, 3739 E. Broad St., to purchase gold from customers.

Councilman Wes Kantor was the lone dissenter.

The city administration requested that council follow the recommendation of the city's zoning commission, concluding that the city had no grounds to deny the permit.

Kantor said he voted against the measure because it was the desire of his constituents.

"I talked to about 30 people," said Kantor, who said he had solicited their opinions about whether he should support a special-permit request.

Kantor said those he surveyed shared his own concern of probability that some of the gold would be stolen property.

"I do my homework, and I asked people what they thought. I voted accordingly," Kantor said.

Council members considered a battery of other legislation, adopting the following measures, all with 5-0 votes:

* An ordinance prohibiting left turns for eastbound traffic on East Broad Street into a parking lot on the north side of East Broad Street, just east of Defense Supply Center Columbus.

* An ordinance authorizing the distribution of $39,376 to the vocational school district that serves Whitehall, reimbursing the district for tax revenue it otherwise would have received associated with tax-increment-financing agreements.

* An ordinance conveying city property to the Whitehall Community Improvement Corp. The parking lot will be sold to Lubell Laboratories, a Bexley company that is moving to Whitehall.